CHAPTER IV.

1. Principles of discourse analysis and

Interpreting discourse

2. Approaches to Discourse Analysis

3. Context & the role of context in the

interpretation of discourse
 1. Principles of discourse analysis and
interpreting discourse

Discourse Analysis: A research method for

studying written or spoken language in relation to its
social context.
> It aims to understand how language is used in
real life situations.
 Some principles of discourse analysis
1. Conducting discourse analysis must focus on:
+ The purposes & effects of different types of language;
+ Cultural rules & conventions in communication;
+ How values, beliefs & assumptions are communicated;
+ How language use relates to its social, political &
historical context
2. Using qualitative research method in humanities
& social science disciplines, including linguistics, sociology,
anthropology, psychology & cultural studies.
 3. In conducting discourse analysis must examine
how language functions & how meaning is created in
different social contexts.
It can be applied to any instance of written or oral
language, as well as non-verbal aspects of communication
such as tone & gestures.

4. Emphasizing the contextual meaning of

language; Focusing on the social aspects of communication
& the ways people use language to achieve specific effects
(e.g. to build trust, to create doubt, to evoke emotions, or to
manage conflict).
 5. Analyzing discourse on multiple levels
since discourse analysis is used to study larger
chunks of language, such as entire
conversations, texts, or collections of texts:
Level of communication, Vocabulary,
Grammar, Structure, Genre, Non-verbal.
 6. Following 4 steps:
Step 1: Define the research question & select the
content of analysis
To do discourse analysis, begin with a clearly defined
research question; developing the question, selecting a range of
material that is appropriate to answer it.
Step 2: Gather information & theory on the context
Must establish the social & historical context in which the
material was produced & intended to be received. (Gathering
factual details of when & where the content was created, who the
author is, who published it, & whom it was disseminated to.)
Conduct a literature review on the topic & construct a
theoretical framework to guide the analysis.
 Step 3: Analyze the content for themes & patterns
Examining various elements of the material: words,
sentences, paragraphs, & overall structure, & relating them
to attributes, themes, & patterns relevant to your research
question.
Step 4: Review your results & draw conclusions
Having assigned particular attributes to elements of
the material, reflect on the results to examine the function &
meaning of the language used; Considering the analysis in
relation to the broader context that was established earlier to
draw conclusions that answer the research question.
 2. Approaches to discourse analysis.

According to Sara Mills in Discourse,

Routledge, London and New York, 1997,
Introduction, there are 3 main approaches to
discourse analysis.
She introduces thought & theoretical
perspectives in the study of discourse analysis.
 1. Linguistic approach.
According to F.de Saussurethe: The nature of
language as a stationary, closed system; distintion of
language & speech.
+ Language is a system, an abstract mental structure,
in general, while speech is the manipulation of language
in specific situations, by specific individuals;
+ Language is a social substance, belonging to the
community while speech belongs to the individual.
+ Languages ​are a priori & immutable constructs
while speech is the generative plane.
> The object of research in linguistics is language, a
product of society that accumulates in each person's
brain, not utterances.
 > Distintion between discourse & text: text - a
static linguistic structure, & discourse - a
dynamic speech structure.

> Discourse analysis focuses on the structure

of spoken language that occurs naturally in
discourses such as dialogue, interviews,
commentary, & speech.
Text analysis focuses on the structures of
written language, in texts such as essays,
notices, road signs, & book chapters.
 * Discourse analysis: a methodological approach to
language analysis above the sentence level,
including criteria: connectivity, reflection, etc.;

* Discourse analysis is approach to oral & written

linguistic documents on the sentence (discourse/text)
from its realistic multifaceted, including linguistic
aspects & situational contexts, with relevant aspects
expressed in the concept of the domain with very rich &
diverse content;

* Discourse analysis aims to highlight the close

relationship between the linguistic structure inside the
text & the elements outside the text.
 The linguistic approach is based on
structuralism: focusing on discovering
the static, invariable structure of
discourses & texts.
 2. The Genre/ Stylistic approach
Bakhtin's views: the genre/stylistic approach to
discourse analysis is developed on the basis of
opposition to Saussure's views on language:
attention to language in life, in communication, the
field of communication.
* The study of "the life of speech", "the flow of
words", in other words, language as a diverse,
living, historical entity rather than a historical
entity; language is not a closed & abstract system.
 * Discourse is a language in a living whole,
specifically, a language in use, in a social context.
* Discourse is the common territory of the
speaker & the listener, the area of ​contact between
us & the other.

* Studying linguistic genre through discourse:

the limitless & ever-changing variety of linguistic
genres of speech in practice & in history.
* Complicated discourse genres: novels,
plays, political treatises, science, etc.
 Thus, if the utterance has bold personal
nuances, expressing the styles of different
speaking subjects, then the discourse genre
represents the linguistic style of each era, with
community & social character, which precedes
& governs the utterances of individuals.

> Language study: the study of discourse in

communication, in diverse & vivid real life.
 3. Sociological approach
M. Foucault's conception of discourse:

First, discourse is considered to be all

statements in general; all utterances or texts that
have some meaning & effect in the real world.
Second, discourse - a group of specific
discourses, conventionally defined in some way &
having a general coherence or effect, "grouped
together by some institutional pressure".
 Third, discourse - a practice that generates
a multitude of statements & governs their
operation, the rules & structures that produce
particular utterances & texts: a system of
"thoughts, opinions, concepts, ways of thinking
& behaving, which are formed in a particular
social context", which have a general effect on
the way of thinking & speech of each group of
people as well as of each individual.
 Discourses strongly influenced by institutions &
powers.
People's utterances & thoughts are not the free
expression of individual thoughts, but are shaped&
locked into a pre-existing framework.

Example. The discourse on femininity, which was

produced & circulated in medieval Vietnam, is a system
of ideas, concepts,& norms of behavior formed in the
context of the feudal state institution of masculinity:
femininity as is humility, endurance, dependence,
weakness (compassion & four virtues), in any text one
finds a familiar formula for describing women: praising
the virtues, sacrifice, tolerance, dependence...
 According to Foucault: both knowledge &
power can only be created, realized, operated &
distributed by & in the discourse:

Power, being "the constitutive condition of all

speech", which not only forbids people to speak but
also allows people to speak;

Knowledge - the product created by discourses;

“the set of general discursive structures within which
a culture defines its ideas”
 Sub-conclusion
These 3 linguistic, genre/stylistic & sociological
approaches have provided three different definitions of
discourse: discourse as the structure of language/speech, &
discourse as speech-thoughts, ideology, & discourse as tools
for knowledge construction & the exercise of power.
These 3 conceptions arise on the basis of different
interpretations of the nature & role of language. These 3
approaches are pervasive & greatly influenced almost all
literary & linguistic theory in the 20th century.
In fact, in the process of development, discourse
theories tend to intertwine, creating areas of interference,
common areas. Since the mid-1990s, a new branch of
discourse research has emerged: Critical discourse analysis
proposed (Fairclough).
 CONTEXT
* In semiotics, linguistics, sociology &
anthropology, context refers to those objects
or entities which surround a focal event.
* In a communicative event Context is
"a frame that surrounds the event &
provides resources for its appropriate
interpretation".
 FEATURES OF CONTEXT
Context embraces the following categories:

* The relevant features of participants:

persons & personalities (verbal/oral action
or non-verbal action of participants).
* The relevant of objects
* The effect of the verbal action
Dell Hathaway Hymes (June 7, 1927, Virginia,
USA)- a linguist, sociolinguist, anthropologist
& folklorist who established disciplinary
foundations for the comparative, ethnographic
study of language use.
 Hymes identifies the following listing of context features:
Addressor (speaker or writer) & addressee (hearer or
listener/decoder of utterance); Audience (unintended
addressees); Topic (range of language); Setting (place,
time, posture, gesture, facial expression; Channel (how the
contact between participants: speech, writing, signing,
signal); Code (kind of language, style of language);
Message-form (chat, debate, sermon, fairytale, love letter,
lecture, radio talk, play…); Event (nature of
communication, genre: opening speech, welcoming
speech, papers); Key (evaluation); Purpose (outcome the
participant want to happen).
Exercise: Analyze the following extract in terms of the features of
context to the extent possible
Mr. President, Mr. Speaker,
Members of the House and the Senate,
Distinguished Americans here as visitors in this
Chamber as I might,
It’s nice to have a fresh excuse for giving a long speech.
When presidents speak to the Congress and the nation from
this podium, typically they comment on the changes and the
opportunities that face the United States, but this is not an
ordinary time for all the many tasks that require our
attention. I believe tonight one calls on us to unite and to
act, that’s our economy…
 CO-CONTEXT
Co-context: The words surrounding a particular
word or passage within a text that provide context
& help to determine meaning (the stretch of
language
occuring before or after the utterance needs to be
interpreted)
Ex. The same evening I went ashore. The first
landing in any new country is very interesting.
(landing is specific meaning determined because
of the previous discourse. The person went ashore,
travelled by ship, not by bus or plane.)
 Principle of Local interpretation
The extend of the context within which the hearer will
interpret where they are (speaker & hearer)/the local setting.
Ex. “A man & a woman sitting in the living room…the
man’s bored, goes to the window, looks out the window…
and goes out to a club, has a drink, talks to the barman.”
> (Hearer assumes that the entities(man &woman) will
remain & local setting will stay constant. The hearer
interpreted that ‘the window’ is of & in the living room, the
club is near to the living room)
 PRINCIPLE OF ANALOGY

An Analogy is a relation of similarity between two

or more things, so that an inference (reasoning from
premise to conclusion) is drawn on the basis of that
similarity.
 The principle of analogy enables the hearer or
listener to interpret discourse in light of his past
experience & background knowledge.

> When the hearer encounters a new situation he

selects from his memory a type of experience he
has generalized before & relates it to his
background knowledge in order to interpret

>> Analogy with previous similar discourse.

 SUMMARY
* The distinction between context & co-text: Co-
text restricted to the linguistic factors; Context refers
to those that are outside language.

* Features of context (by Hypes)

* The 2 principles of Local interpretation &

Analogy
 Revision of chapter IV
1. Present the principles of discourse analysis
2. Present 4 steps to interpret discourse
3. Present 3 approaches to discourse analysis:
Linguistic, Genre and Sociological